"So, then—he—he had it when he came aboard?"
"He had it when he came aboard," assented Hugh, moving for the group to be seated. "But——"
"Wait," said Ramsey. "Mustn't we all be as gay and happy as we can?" And when every one but the judge's sister playfully said yes she turned to the Vicksburg merchant: "Then will you change places with Mr. Gilmore?"
Faith, he would! It paired him with the actor's wife, and his wife with the actor. Gayety began forthwith. "And will you change—with—with you?" Ramsey asked the planter of Milliken's Bend and the squire's brother-in-law.
Indeed they would. The change not only paired each with the other's wife but brought the brother-in-law next to Ramsey. Underfoot meantime the engine bells jingled, overhead the scape-pipes roared, and in every part the boat quivered as her great wheels churned or was strangely quiet as they paused for another signal. So all sat down, well aware what the landing was for, and began blithely to converse and be waited on, as if the world were being run primarily for their innocent delight.
What a Sabbath feast was there spread for a bishop to say grace upon, and what travellers' hunger to match it. Among Hugh and Ramsey's dozen, if no further, how the conversation rippled, radiated, and out-tinkled and out-twinkled the fine tablewares. One almost forgot his wine or that the boat and her wheels had stopped; might have quite forgotten had not certain sounds, starting in full volume from the lower deck but arriving under the cabin floor faint and wasted—emaciated, as you might say—stolen up and in. A diligent loquacity contrived to ignore the most of them. The soft chanting of the priest as he walked down the landing-stage and out upon the damp brown sands, followed by the bearers of the new pine box and by a short procession of bowed mourners, perished unheard at the table; but many noises more penetrative were also much more discomfiting, and it was fortunate that the talk of the bishop and others could charm most of them away even from the judge's nervous sister, who, nevertheless, amid such remote themes as Jenny Lind, Nebraska, coming political conventions, and the new speed record of the big Eclipse in the fourteen hundred and forty miles from New Orleans, could not help a light start now and then. It was good, to Hugh and to Ramsey, to see how the actor, Gilmore, despite this upward seepage of ghostly cries—faint notes of horror, anguish, and despair—attenuated groans and wailings of bodily agony—held the eyes of the ladies nearest him with tales of travel and the theatre, and mention of the great cut-off of 1699, which they would soon pass and must notice. But quite as good was it to the wives of Vicksburg and Milliken's Bend to observe with what fluency Hugh, commonly so quiet, discoursed to Mrs. Gilmore and to Ramsey on other river features near at hand: Dead Man's Bend, Ellis Cliffs, Natchez Island, the crossing above it, Saint Catherine's Creek, and Natchez itself.
"Where I was born!" said Ramsey. "Largest town in Mississippi and the most stuck-up."
The other Mississippians laughed delightedly.
"We stop there," said Hugh, "to put off freight."
"Mr. Courteney," asked Ramsey, "what is a 'crossing'?"